DON HERTZFELDT&

THORNE BRANDTPRESENTATION BY NOEL JOHNSON

DON HERTZFELDT

• Don Hertzfeldt is an award winning animator born in California. He is best known for his stick-figure animation style and dark, slapstick, and absurd subject matter. He usually utilizes what can be considered more analog techniques to execute his animations by photographing his drawings with 35-mm film cameras and creating effects solely using outside light sources and experimental photography. However, he has delved into the use of digital animation in his most recent short film “World of Tomorrow”.

THORNE BRANDT

• Thorne Brandt is a Chicago-based multimedia artist who is known for is collage style and use of more modern mediums, such as gifs. One such example is his Tumblr page, the gif connoisseur (http://thegifconnoisseur.tumblr.com/).

COMMON MOTIFS

• Uncertainty

• Subjective Perception of Time and Reality

• Ontological Actuality

AGOD

https://vimeo.com/43162372

Summary:

• The title of this piece is an acronym for Animated Gif Of the Day. In this five minute video Thorne

Brandt layers animated gifs on top of one another. However, this was not done in one go. Brandt, each day, layers a new gif into the video. He considers this work organic in the sense that it never reaches a point of total completion since a new layer is added and the piece is ever changing, even slightly. The piece began in 2012, and as far as observation can tell, is still ongoing today.

Analysis:

• Touches on subjects of: Uncertainty, Entropy, and Subjective Perception

WORLD OF TOMORROW

Summary:

• “World of Tomorrow” is a short film spanning 16 minutes following the story of Emily, or more so the stories that Emily shows to herself. A third-generation clone of Emily from 227 years into the future from when this film is set travels through time in order to show what is known as “Emily prime” her memories as a clone as well as what she knows as modern societal norms. However, when retrieved “Emily prime” is incredibly young and is shown as having an inability to understand what is truly happening. They cover several memories such as clone Emily’s love stories, jobs, and the inevitable end of the world.

Analysis:

• Several scenes and concepts cover the motifs mentioned as well as the idea of a struggle between true existence through body or through mind.

• Particular scenes and concepts include: The times “Emily prime” mistakes clone Emily’s memories as her own, The consciousness cubes and their respective scenes, The moon robots and their depressed poetry, and clone Emily’s love story.

Backup link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rWeGcWDmnIQ

RESOURCE LINKS

• https://thedissolve.com/features/interview/980-animator-don-hertzfeldt-on-not-trusting-happy-peop/

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_Hertzfeldt

• http://www.fountainheadresidency.com/thorne-brandt/

• http://pizzadog.org/